Marc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome Ms McCaffrey and Mr. O'Driscoll. They say that a new broom sweeps clean even though I know that both of them have been involved in the service before and at the outset I pay tribute to the hardworking prison staff that we have in the service all over the country, be they administrative staff, officers or otherwise. I apologise in advance because people - particularly journalists - can be of the view that I am a bit abrupt in questioning. None of it is intentional; I only do so to get to the answers as quickly as we can in order to move forward. I may interrupt our guests as we are moving forward.

Our guests indicated that there are prison officers who had made a statement of claim and sworn an affidavit and that the matter is before the court. That is fine but, for the record, there is no protected disclosure before the court so are we safe enough in talking about a protected disclosure.